


On the Exhale

by Elizabeth1985



Series: Destiel Ficlets [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Feels, M/M, Sad, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-03
Updated: 2014-03-03
Packaged: 2018-01-14 11:15:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1264375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elizabeth1985/pseuds/Elizabeth1985
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After decades spent alone, Sam Winchester receives the call he's been waiting for. The voice is unfamiliar to him, the years having changed it over time, but he knows who it is.  The end is finally here, waiting for him, waiting for them.  </p><p>"It's okay, Dean. I'll see you soon."</p>
            </blockquote>





	On the Exhale

**Author's Note:**

> Got this image in my head last Friday. I could hardly sleep this weekend thinking about this scenery playing out. I couldn't write it well enough for how it felt in my head, but I hope it comes across okay.

 

The storm door creaks at the hinges as he pushes it open; a whiny groan begging for grease. The elderly man walks through; his hand sliding off the edge to let it swing and bang shut behind him, clanging repeatedly against the wood frame before it settles. The wide orange sun is setting fast over the black treetops; a spiky line that defines the pine forest surrounding his cabin. The warm, vibrant streaks of colour layered across the sky bring to mind a rainbow that’s been smudged over by a large hand. Perhaps it was the hand of God, Sam wonders with bitter shaded detachment.

He lowers gingerly into one of the wooden chairs on the small porch, his joints straining in protest from the simple task. The seat creaks under his weight and the sound never ceases to surprise him. He doesn’t seem weighted enough anymore to cause strain on furniture, but as it is the noises occur.  So many creaks and groans surround him now: the old cabin protesting to the wind, his bones angry from old injuries, and the bowing floorboards under his cold feet.  The noises are sad to his ears like a harmony of slow death.

Seventy-two is his age now. It shouldn’t be so, he declares internally with a frown that settles more lines into his aged face. How could someone whose lived the life he has, ever make it to such an age; when innocent, fragile passerby’s to the underworld of life have been snuffed out by such dull occurrences like mild complication of disease or a Friday morning bike accident? What justice is this?

_It isn’t fair._ The words repeat themselves until they became a terrible song inside his head. The song has a base to it, a trembling, jarring ring that he knows is the echo of the only phone he has. In reality, no phone is ringing. He’s certain it will never ring again. If it does, he won’t be around to hear it.

His thoughts are without direction: the three words and the ringing drowning out the beauty of dusk and so he closes his eyes to break the cycle.  The fragile thin lids tremble as they try in vain to hold everything inside of him.

Other noises return to the forefront of his mind and they are not ones he is ready to face. ‘ _Hello?’_ The voice had been deep though it was no longer familiar to him. ‘ _I’m calling about your brother.’_ He should have recognized it, but it had changed so much over the years with age and sadness, ‘ _He’s gone, Sam,’_ and decades had passed since they’d seen each other. ‘ _I thought you should know.’_ The voice had said at the end of the call.  _At the end. It was the end._ Was this true? Did he have a right to that knowledge after so long?

He’s not spoken to his older brother in nearly forty years. The voice on the phone, not by its familiarity or lack thereof, but the simple knowledge of to whom the voice belongs stirs a wealth of memories in him; every one is painful and horrific.  It isn’t a shock that it was him who would deliver such a call in the end; for who else would have been there for his brother’s last breath on earth? Some, in the past, would have said himself. 

They would have been wrong.

A flock of birds suddenly make a loud, hasty escape from the west end of the clearing; no doubt startled by an unseen predator. Sam watches their black shapes tear across the sky in search of safety. The colours of the ceiling that covers the earth are fading into darkness, all the warmth leaching away to be replaced by a bone-deep chill. The night is coming in swiftly and Sam feels no desire to retreat into the confines of his cabin. He prefers instead to watch as the shadows creep over him. To be swathed in darkness is not an unfamiliar feeling. Nor is the weight in his palm, its heft and solidity; the cold metal warmed by his thin, wrinkled skin.

_I wasn’t there for you,_ he confesses in a silent prayer. _I left you and it has always been my deepest regret_. The weight is lifted, but not the one in his heart.  The pressure against his temple is an apology.

_It’s okay Dean, I’ll see you soon._

_…_

Birds and four-legged creatures scatter frantically at the shot that pierces the darkening landscape. The sharp crack of the gun echoes long and loud for nearly a half minute before the stark silence takes over.  The return of the calm is eerie, as though the very essence of nature has felt the loss. The stillness suspends in the forest, paused like a breath being held.

The last of the light descends over the horizon, casting the Angel’s view into various shadows and uncertain shapes. He stands on the western edge of the clearing with a solemn expression, worn by a face he hasn’t assumed in many long years.  Lines have been erased, smoothed out by the return of his grace. A part of the Angel worries that with the lines, memories, too, will soon disappear.  He holds them tightly to his heart, just in case.

_The Winchester’s are in heaven,_ the Angel says to God, his fingertips brushing the worn fabric of his coat as they bunch into hard fists. His Father does not reply, nor has he ever.

A long human life has been spent here on earth. _Here_ , with his charge; his companion; and in the end, the one person he vowed to love forever – not that there was ever really an alternative. A palm to shoulder so long ago had sealed that fate. Strange that such a profound beginning began in the midst of blood and fire. The return of affections was merely an unexpected, glorious gift that he still finds hard to believe after all this time. That love is now a tangible weight in his soul, embedded in the very essence of his grace and he will carry it with him for eternity or until his death. As wondrous as his fortunes became, his regrets tug hard during his ruminations.

Throughout the life that he was graciously given (or ungraciously as is this case), the Angel vehemently tried to repair the wounds and scars that went unseen between the brothers; the _deep_ cuts that had fixed and rutted themselves into geographical and perpetual separation. His efforts notwithstanding, he had failed them alive. Finally, in death they will become family once again; surrounded by those they’ve lost and missed.

Whole again. _Together._

In the eyes of any other Angel, the result would be considered a success. Against all odds, he has managed to protect those he was commanded to keep safe and to see them unto heaven at their respective ends.  The remarkably quiet, uneventful ends that they were. C _onsidering_.

As it should be.

In the quiet border of the woods with the smell of pine and damp earth in his nose, he feels anything but successful. He feels alone and bereft. The story of the Winchesters is over and one day it will form the words of a new gospel.  But all too soon another story will take shape; with new villains and new heroes that will decide the course of the earth – but the Angel will have no place in it. Unable to return to the home he was born to, and unwilling to go back to the one that he shared with another, his purpose now shall be to move unseen through humanity and provide assistance in whatever ways he can. He will bring peace and happiness to those who deserve it as a balance to his grief.

He takes one last look at the cabin, his old coat blowing back in the breeze, and feels the light stretch inside of him, the feeling peculiar and forgotten. The Angel unfurls his spine and lets his wings spread out behind him. A breeze passes through the trees like a breath of nature.  On the exhale, he is gone.

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know if this came across for you, or if it didn't quite give you any feels - any idea why? I'd like to improve it if I can. Also, switched the title to On the Exhale, seems to be the more preferable choice and I think I agree as well! Thanks for the input :)
> 
> Thanks for reading this little scene.


End file.
